Britt-Arnhild's House in the Woods

A quite different Prague

"Hey, what is she up to now?" I guess you are asking. "This can't be Britt-Arnhild's Prague?????"

No, it is not. It really isn't. It is Prague though, but not the Prague I know.

It was during the rainy day. I was starting to get wet, I felt cold. I had spent time among Alphons Mucha's art, I had sat for a long time in an oldfashined coffee house. It was time to do something new. Something different.

"Why don't you surprise yourself" I thought. I looked around to see if I could get any ideas.....

And there it was. A huge, glittering shopping mall. Thousands of sparkling lightbulbs. I had never rested my eyes on them before, as this is not what I watch for when I travel. But now I wanted to do something new. I walked in. It felt like walking into an alien world. Out in space. Glamour, lights, windows and mirrors everywhere. I walked around, up and down escalators, afraid to get lost.......No map to help me if I did.

Believe me, this is really not where I go if I have time at hand. But travelling is about exploring new territory, isn't it. As I walked on I knew that the other ladies in my group would have been thrilled to visit this shopping heaven. But I was alone and I felt lost. Though I did enjoyed the expedition.

I didn't go into one single store though, well, at least not untill I found:

L'Occitane.....this wonderful chain which sells cosmetics from Provence. Cosmetics which even I can use without any allergic reactions. Suddenly I remembered that I needed a handcream.

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For me the visit to the mall turned out like a surprise, like a treat. I loved it, though I am not sure if I'll feel the need to visit again if I ever go back to Prague. If I do it must be to show Ingrid and Marta :-)

Have you surprised yourself lately?

Done something unexpected?

Golden days, golden moments

 
The days in Prague are over, when I write this, the bus which will take us to the airport will be here in a couple of hours - just enough time for me for a walk in the park across the street, and a cup of coffee at the famous Fantove Kavarna (the cafe at Franz Joseph Rainway Station).

The days here have been filled with interesting work and golden moments of exploring a city.

 
My "trick and treat-hat" is filled with stories. To be shared or to me saved deep in my heart.

 I am seriously considering to start a separate travel blog. The stories are so many.

But now I am off to Fantove Kavarna, to write the last pages in my travel diray.

Caffe Avec...Part5! Hotel Evropa in Prague, and some Alphons Mucha

A rainy day? Well, visit a coffee house of course, or several coffee houses. And then as some of you mentioned, museums and exhibitions.........

But let me start somewhere near the beginning. I am cheating you a little, because I had coffee in Hotel Evropa already the first day, which was not a rainy day. When the rainy day came I had coffee....somewhere else. But to cover it all I would have to blog a new post every hour, and then I wouldn't have time to see as much of Pragueas I have.......hard choice! well, not exactly, exploring Prague live has priority to blogposting of course.

Hotel Europa was built in the art noveau style in 1903-06, and even now, more than 100 years later, it is keeping it's style. An elegant outdoor facade, inside it looks almost exactly as it did a decade ago.

I sat down with a caffe latte and a book....... ands my moleskin travel diary.

 
 
It must have been on my second day in Prague, in another coffee house, that I picked up the meny but never made it past the front page. The illustration stirred something in me, the seducing woman looked like a cousin of Sandro Boticelli's Prima Vera, but had her own charm...... what was this.....

Later in the day I saw a signature which caught my interest. It looked so much like Munch, Edward Munch....

All of a sudden I saw these seducing women, this almost familiar signature, everywhere, and then it didn't take me long to seek out more information. It all led to one name, one man - Alphons Mucha. An artist totally new to me, not at all new to the world.

Look close at the words written on the yellow house.....

Yes, an Alphons Mucha exhibition.

A perfect refuge for the rain.

I love it when the sun shines down on me like this on a rainy day. A NEW ARTIST. A new world to explore. Yes, of course I bought a 2010 calendar, and yes, of course I bought a book about Mucha, his life and his work.

But.......I can't keep on travelling like this. Then there will be no time to explore more deeply all the things I discover..... 

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Back in Hotel Evropa I am so busy with my looking around. When I leave I also leave one of my books, Jan Neruda's Prague Tales from the Little Quarter.

When I come to search for it the next day, it is gone. Hopefully another booklover is enjoying it. I've already bought a replacement.

What to do on a rainy day

 Yes, Prague is surely different from the hot summer visit Terje and I had three hears ago. Our meeting was finished at 3.30pm yesterday and I hurried out to breath the Prague air.

But what do you do on a rainy day?

Rain or shine. There is always alot to do.

I am working on my first Caffe Avec post from Prague and will publish it as soon as it is finished. Today we have no meetings though, and I won't spend much time in the hotel room.

Impressions on 2nd visit. Falling in love again.

Three years ago Terje and I came to Praha for the first time. It was easy to fall in love with the city during a few hot days of summer. We were on our feet from early morning till late night and managed to explore many of the most famous sites.

This time in Praha is different. I am here without Terje, with a group of Sami people which I work with. We have four days here, two of them will almost totally be filled with meetings inside the hotel. Hot summer days have gone, noW it is icy cold autumn.

Though this is a work trip, I do travel with an open traveler's mind, and there are always breaks when I can leave the hotel, to explore, to breath the atmosphere, to shoot photos, to seek out yet another coffee house.

As I am the only one in the group who has been here before, I promised to take them on a short, kind of guided tour yesterday. We walked from our hotel, down Vaclavske Namesti down to The Old Town Square and the famour clock. From there I took them to the Jewish Quarter, and got a good proof that I am no trained guide. We had planned to visit the Old Jewish Cementery, what I forgot was that it is of course closed on a Saturday, on a Sabbath.

Later I walked on, on my own. With my guidebook in hand I headed for the monastery St.Agnes of Bohemia. I spent an hour there in silence, ending up in the gift store where I bought a Prague calendar, a few books, cds with music by Dvorak and Smetana. Afterwards I kept on, Charles Bridge, the river, the cubist houses, beauty, charm, atmosphere.

This trip is different. Terje is not here, and my heart is still beathing stromg and warm for Krakow......at the same time Prague is slowly getting under my skin.

It is Sunday morning. I have just finished a two hour presentation on what it is to be an elected schurch board member. Now it is coffee break and I treat myself with some computer time, some "making plans for tonight-"plans.

Corey Amaro, the owner of Tongue in Cheek, visited Prague this sommer. Look at some of her photos here.

Happy Halloween from Praha

After a short night home in the House in the Woods, I left Trondheim airport at 7am. 2 1/2 hours later I landed in Praha, early enough to get a full day here.

It is Halloween, and I have been walking around with my hat all day to gather tricks and treats for upcoming blog posts, upcoming writing. I am glad I have a huge tricks and treats hat, the stories are plentiful.

I am in desperate need of a nap though, I slept only 3 or 4 hours last night. So please be patient. The stories will come. Meanwhile, why don't you enjoy a cup of hot chocolate with me in this small coffee shop. The chocolate was so full, so thick, that the spoon could stand by herself.......Mmmmmm, delicious.

Just one more Prague post.

Our days in Prague was so filled with experiences and good moments, I can keep on blogging about it for weeks. But I have other themes for blogging as well, so I will give you just one more Prague blog, at least for now, this time from Prague's castle and cathedral area, Prazsky Hrad a Hradcany.

When you visit a city for the first time and only have three days you have to chose what you want to see and to do. Just walking around, breathing the atmosphere is always on top of our list, Terje wanted to see historical places like Vaclav Square, and I had opera or classic music as a main goal, and we both wanted a tour on the river. We had a wonderful two hour lunch on the river one day, we went to the National Marionette Theatre for Mozart's Don Giovanni and loved every single minute of it, we had coffe and a long walk on Vaclav Square, and we walked, walked, walked around. And everywhere we walked we could see the hill with the castle and the cathedral. At first we didn't have any spesific interests in going there ; "why shall we do like all other tourists?". But the last day we decided to do it anyway. And gosh, we are so happy we did!

The day was HOT, but neither of us mind sweating as long as we have our water bottles, so we climed the steep hill up to the castle and bought  "see it all" tickets. The area consists of the castle, three churches and an abbey, and also a small area with several very small houses, The Golden Lane, where the legends tell about  he people who used to live there; The Small People. And there were also a National Gallery of Portraits. (Ha, as I write this now I know that I just have to write you more blogs about this later.......there were so many wonderful things to see, so many perfect impressions., so many new artists to me.)

We climed almost 300 stairs to get to the top of the cathedral tower and a perfect house roofs view of Prague, oh, yes, it was terrible hot in the heath, but well worth it, but what took my breath away was the many stained glass windows in the cathedral. Having lived with the stained glass rose window and all the stained glasses telling stories from the Bible in the Nidaros Cathedral here in Trondheim all my life, I am a true lover of this spesific art. And coming into the St.Vitus Cathedral was like goming into a new and yet unknown room in heaven! (I am so thankful that Jesus has promised us a heaved with many rooms, and so thankful whenever I am taken to one of them). I have no words to describe what I saw, and it was not easy to get good photos, but I have the windows kept in my heart to enjoy for a long time.

But we could not stay inside the cathedral for ever. There was so much more to see, and open minded, open eyed and together we took it all in.

And to top it all I found a localy made nativity scene in one of the artshops in The Golden Lane. With all the travelling I have been able to do this year my collection of nativity scenes is growing fast. (But that's a story to be for my Advent Basket writing in December).

Prague Botanic Garden

Sunday we spent a couple of hours in the botanical garden in Nové Mesto (The New Town)in Prague. The garden's main attraction is a water lily, Victoria Cruziana, which is strong enough to carry a small child when it's blooming. During summer the lily gets dozens of flowers, though each one survive only one day. We were not lucky enough to see any flowers, but the leaves were also worth a visit.

King Karl IV (Charles VI) founded the first botanic garden in Prague in the 14th century, though there is nothing left of it now as far as I know. The University garden which we visited were founded in 1775 elsewere in the city, but was moved to Nové Mesto in 1897.

When we visited the garden there was a special Art and Charity mosaic project going on. I bought an art card, and was then allowed to make my own mosaic which will be part of a huge mosaic decoration which will tour gardens all over Europe. You can find more information about it here: http://www.femancipation.com/main.php The card I bought has a special number, and my piece of mosaic got the same number, si I will be able to track it on it's touring.

Prague, a City of Fellow Readers.

I love cities where I find fellow readers. As I did in Prague. There were bookstores, book pubs, book cafés and “Antikvariats” around every corner, and you didn’t have to look long to find people reading in public – on the tram, in parks or just standing on the pavement deep in a book.

When I pack for a trip my books are always the most important to me, which means that my suitcase is always heavy. But I can rather do without clean clothes than without books. I pack notebooks, travel books, traveller’s tales, usually several travel diaries, guidebooks, maps, novels to read…….you name it. And the first thing I do unpacking in a new room is to stack my books, on the desk and on the night table.

Prague has always been a city of and for authors, poets and readers. It is the city of Franz Kafka, Milan Kundera, Rainer Maria Rilke, Karel Capek and several others. A couple of weeks ago I found a wonderful treasure at a junk sale here in Trondheim, Cesky Roman/A Czech Novel by Olga Capek. It is a huge book, hardbound from 1951, giving a lot of information about the city and the country, but most of all about Olga’s life with Karel. I did a search on amazon today to see if I could find more books by Olga, she must have written a lot, in between being a famous actor, but I did not have any luck. I found many by her husband though, and ordered a few, among them a travel book from his travel to Norway (I know I have read it before and used to have it in my shelves, but no it is nowhere to be found) and a book where he writes about his life as a gardener.

There were so many things we wanted to do during our three days in Prague, so there was not much time for browsing book stores. But the last night I had forgotten my three days tram ticket in the hotel room (NOT on purpose), so while Terje went back to find the ticket I had 15 minutes in the big book store near the tram station J Most of the books were in the local language, but I also found a good section with English books. And among them a lot of translated Czech literature. I bought “Prague in Black and Gold, the History of a Cit” by Peter Demetz, and “Prague Tales from the Little Quarter” by Jan Neruda.

I did not know very much about Czech literature before starting planning this summer, but give me a month or two and I will be a master J

How can I describe Prague?

Describing our three days in Prague with a few words is impossible. Like always I travelled equipped with camera and travel diary, so my memories are both on photos and papers. I will go back to them again and again, make sketches, short travel stories and photo albums, and keep the most precious moments deep in my heart.

I always have mixed feelings when I come to a place for the first time. I read alot about the place before travelling, maps, guidebooks, litterature, history, politics, flora and fauna, arts, religion.....there are always so many new and wonderful things to learn. Still, or may be rather because of this, I have this strange feeling: what will this place give me? Will I be able to understand it's life, it's people, it's background, it's today?

Prague managed to give me, in three days, much more than I asked for. We came home today, had visitors for dinner almost before we had unlocked our door, and have spent the night unpacking and tidying the house. So it is just now that I found time to download the hundreds of photos I took. And to live through part of these wonderful three days again. Dear reader of my blog; you don't have a choice. If you keep on reading this blog you will get to know more about Prague, the Mother of All Cities.